Problems

August 09, 2008
2008 has been a bit of a rough year thus far!
2008 has been a bit of a rough year thus far! In the spring our taxi was hit by a young driver and sustained a significant amount of damage. We got the van fixed, but we decided it was becoming a liability as a taxi due to the rising gas prices, the accident, and difficulty finding honest and reliable drivers. We pulled it off the road as a taxi, which allowed the village to focus on the chicken project as the main source of income. Friends of Kibooba was providing funds to pay the teachers and buy lunches for the children over the past 5 months as the chicken money was saved for re-investment in more chicks. However the chicken project also began having problems over the last several months. Despite Joel's best efforts, the production of the chickens kept going down to the point where they were costing more to feed than the money being earned from the eggs. The veterinarian who was consulted felt that there were ultimately two things that had gone wrong: 1) we were deceived when we purchased the particular breed of chickens and 2) the feed quality was poor. So, in mid August we had to say goodbye to the feathered ladies! We are now in a period of transition. Joel is presently doing continual cycles of purchasing, milling and selling rice in order to turn some profit and earn enough to buy chickens from a more reputable breeder. Although we were originally discouraged, we realize that not everything works out the best on the first try. We have all learned from our experiences and we're very excited about improving a few things and trying again! We are making connections with others who have expertise in income generation to determine our next steps. On a positive note, a dentist and two dental students from the University of British Columbia visited Kibooba village this summer. All of the children had their teeth checked and were given tooth brushes and dental hygiene education.
Stay tuned...